Now Worth Many Points, this Apocalypse?
by Anthony Peterson
Summary: Captain Williard and a light-side path Jedi Shadow and her familiar Qyzen Fess trade universes. Now Tamaraigh and Qyzen face deadly real world guns with sneakiness and powers unknown to the world, while Williard learns about the Havoc Squad and becomes a new class Trooper 4efc93a.
1. Chapter 1

Apocalypse Now events in 1969

George Lucas had his ideas for Star Wars and started writing in 1973

What about a mixup of these two? Bringing in modern The Old Republic stories.

Apocalypse Now characters

Benjamin Willard - special forces, (worked intelligence, counter-intel for US Central Intelligence Agency)

Navy Patrol Boat, riverine (PBR)

Chief - commander of the boat

Lance - crewman

Chef - crewman

Mr. Clean - crewman

Cavalry Squadron

Lieutenant Colonel Bill Kilgore

Cambodia

Walter Kurtz - insane guy leading a cult of locals in Cambodia

Captain Colby (joined Kurtz)

SWTOR characters

The Shadow - female Jedi Shadow who just passed act one of the Jedi Consular storyline

The Shadow exclusively relies on Qyzen Fess for backup. Qyzen Fess is a Transdoshan who follows the Scorekeeper and tries to earn points.

Yoda #1, #2, #3 - in game disguises of SWTOR admins who take Willard when they can't identify his class, level or equipment.

Williard as Smuggler or Trooper?

Smugglers have a closer weapon style, but Williard has been special forces before but never interested in money for its own stake, so he chooses trooper reluctantly, not liking or aware of the advantages of armor.

Ord Mantell

Havoc Squad

Gearbox - technician

ZR-57 Orbital Strike Bomb

Fort Garnik - Local Republic base in Ord Mantell

Commander Harron Tavus - Havoc Squad Commander

Needles - Cyborg medical expert of Havoc Squad

Lieutenant Aric Jorgan - Cathar Lieutenant (ranged firepower)

Fuse - Zabrak explosives export of Havoc Squad

Initial mission : destroy the handheld weapons caches.

Ord Mantell mission : secure the ZR-57.

Consular background info

Chapter 1: Wake up Shadow

Tamaraigh had cured Parkanas of his afflictions, but still couldn't get out of her mind how much damage he had done to the order by turning all those jedi with the disease.

Meditating, she continued to relax, and let her emotions about the battle and confrontation with Parkanas fade away. Her saberstaff was secured firmly, and turned off. Her brown robe was newly cleaned after taking on the dust of a dozen worlds, as she was granted the rare honorific Barsen'thor for her efforts in curing the afflicted jedi and finding the source of the disease.

She had to report to the council in two hours, there was another mission already, a diplomatic mission. It would be nice to settle into more of a consular's role for a while. She had been battle tested, relying on her saberstaff and other techniques to fight amid what seemed to be a fracturing galaxy. Every planet she'd been to was embroiled in conflict at one level or another. Gang wars, civil wars and the overall conflict between the Republic and Sith Empire made even diplomatic efforts a reconnaissance in force.

Her silence was broken with the characteristic sound of an incoming urgent message. She stood up, and walked over to the holoterminal.

It wasn't the council or another master on the other end, but someone she didn't recognize.

"Master Jedi, this is the Coruscant Port Master", the man started. She winced, and hated how those not in the order seemed to call all of their number masters. She was no master, not yet. "We are detecting extreme energy readings from your ship. Please explain yourself!"

The ship was in standby mode, not even running at full power. "The main engine isn't even running, I will verify that none of my passengers are responsible in these energy readings."

"I will reconnect with you in twenty minutes then. Port Master out."

The man was pretty young to be a port master, but then, with so many involved in the republic military effort, perhaps he was the best left to fill that role.

She hit the internal comms, "Ship meeting. Please meet me at the holoterminal immediately."

It was only Qyzen Fess, Tharan Cedrax and C2-N2 onboard. She admitted to being biased and preferred to fight with Fess by her side. Cedrax's attitude and approach to life didn't match what she was looking for in a battle companion. C2-N2 was just a ship droid.

Qyzen Fess was the first to appear. "More points, yes?" he asked.

Tamaraigh smiled at the trandoshan. The others didn't have time to get there as an energy surge surrounded the holo and the two of them, and they were gone. Disappeared from the corvette.

"Where is everyone," Tharan Cedrax asked C2-N2, and "what is that smell!"

Like the smell of a burnt out astromech droid, he concluded.

"Master Tamaraigh is not on this vessel. Qyzen Fess is not on this vessel. Unknown human is on this vessel! In Master's meditation room."

Williard was catching what sleep he could while there was still a chance. In the back of the patrol boat, his rifle resting a few feet away. He had to thank Lance for getting Kilgore to agree to help with the mission. There was some serious shit up ahead, and these PBR boys weren't ready for it. Chief was too full of himself to realize the bigger picture. The mission was way more important than some patrol boat chief.

He opened his eyes for a moment, the air surrounding him seemed to be humming, and turning a greyish blue. What the hell?

The multiversal pulse filled the air onboard that boat, and onboard the republic corvette. Captain Williard was transferred from the back of the boat to the meditation room of the corvette. Tamaraigh and Qyzen Fess were transferred from the holoterminal area of the corvette to the front of the boat. Right in front of the Chief's eyes.

"Holy shit! Someone's on the boat! Get off my God Damn boat!"

He pulls out his pistol, and only then realizes that one of them is not human. "Shit". He shoots the green alien. BLAM BLAM BLAM. The green alien falls backwards into the water. The other, a lady wearing a funny brown robe disappears.

"Williard, Mr. Clean."

"Don't know where Captain Williard is boss. What was that thing?" Lance said.

"Let's fish it out of the water," Chief says.

Lance, Mr. Clean and Chef looked for the green alien but couldn't find him.

"Williard, where the hell are you?"

This was beyond surprising. This was shocking. One moment she was unboard her ship, the next moment Qyzen was shot and killed in two seconds. What kind of high powered guns did these people have. Far louder than a blaster, and way more powerful too. She gone invisible as soon as Qyzen fell backwards into the water. She hadn't been on a boat since her childhood. It was small, but she identified a bigger version of the gun that killed Qyzen Fess as being mounted to the back of this boat. It was a planetary military boat. This was not Coruscant. The occupants of the boat didn't look familiar at all. She had never run into their organization, whatever it was.

She turned visible again, her time running out. She was at the back of the boat, away from the 'enemy', for the moment. They would see her and Qyzen any moment now. "Fess, come back," she whispered, and the Trandoshan appeared out of nowhere. She didn't really doubt it, but it was nice to see respawning worked here as well as anywhere. She wondered where her own respawn point was on this planet.

She didn't sense that the occupants of the boat were hostile, but they did shoot Qyzen with their high powered weapon. They were weak of will however.

The three humans spotted them in the back of the boat.

"You won't hurt us," Tamaraigh said.

"We won't hurt you," the one in charge said.

"We just want to talk," Tamaraigh said.

"You just want to talk."

"Worth no points, are they," Qyzen said.

"Sit down," Tamaraigh told the others. They sat down in front of her and Qyzen.

"I'm Chief, this is Lance, Chef, and Clean." the man in charge said, pointing to the others.

Tamaraigh sat down, and Qyzen followed her lead.

"What planet is this?" she asked.

The chief laughed, "Planet insane."

She wasn't familiar with that one.

"What kind of weapons are those?"

"This is a .45. Chef and Clean have their M14s," Chief said.

"You don't use blasters?" Tamaraigh asked. "And stay calm," she said, making sure none of them freaked out about Qyzen.

"What's a blaster? Who are you?"

"I am Jedi Consular Tamaraigh, and this is my counterpart, Qyzen Fess."

"Can't say I understand any of that, but why here and now. Did you kill Captain Willard. Williard, are you out there?"

"Of course not," Tamaraigh said. "We didn't see anyone other than you three."

"We were taking Williard upriver for some special mission of his. Dumb ass war."

"Fuck this war," Chef said.

Figures, Tamaraigh thought to herself, every planet we go to is in the middle of some war or conflict.

"Can you tell me more about this war. Assume you're telling a youngling, we know nothing of it," Tamaraigh said.

"Not know, how can you not know, you're right in the shitpile."

"Just tell me," she insisted.

"I'll tell her," Lance said. "Everyone back in Washington is afraid the commies are going to take all of Vietnam, and then the rest of Asia and the rest of the World, leaving the free world isolated. They wanted to stop the commies in Vietnam, first by training the locals, but now all of us are here, trying to stop them VC. The people don't even want us here. It's just fucked up."

"These commies, who are they?" she continued.

"Worth many points perhaps, yes?"

"The Soviet Union, and all their lackeys. They don't believe in freedom, supposedly, but Washington doesn't really give a shit either," Lance said.

"We need to get back to your base then," Tamaraigh said. "You need to vouch for my friend here so they don't shoot."

"It's a long f'ing way, we're deep in the shit now, ma'am."

Tamaraigh heard a sound, similar to what had come out of that "45" that Chief used, She stood up, looking for it's source.

"Get down!" Someone get on the gun."

Something hit her hard, and she tumbled to the ground, dead on the spot. A perfect headshot. Qyzen disappeared right in front of the crew."

Willard had been lying down in the boat taking a nap, and now he was … somewhere else. He tensed up, looking for his gun. It was back on that boat, he was sure of it. He'd fought unarmed before, and he could again.

Have I been captured, and placed into some strange cell? And yet this place seemed strangely decorative for that idea.

The sight of a robot told him that he'd gone insane instead. Something out of the old pulps was walking around on what he now realized was a ship. A … space … ship.

"I'm sorry sir, but as far as I know, Master Tamaraigh has not granted you access rights to her ship," the robot said.

"What a suave, desperate man," Cedrax said. "We have no idea where Tamaraigh, and the Trandoshan went. Let him stay onboard."

"What the hell?" Willard yelled, confusion filling him.

Dozens of cubicles filled the large office floor. Three men were huddled around a computer screen.

"There's a bug in the system. A character has been either accidentally or deliberately corrupted. He's inside another character's ship, without being invited, and his Class is null. His Account ID is also null. His storyline progress indicator is Consular Act2P1. His data object has no force powers attached. His available weapon list includes foreign keys not even present in the weapon type table."

"We get it," one of the others. "What do you want to do about it Joe? We should ban his account."

"Ban who? We don't have an account ID. Let's remote into Shadowlands first, and see what he'll tell us."

"Sounds good, I'll let the Gamemaster know."

Willard had asked the robot where he could get a drink, and tried to get out of the ship to head there. The door was locked. The robot C2-N2 said that was unusual.

Then 3 little green puppets showed up.

"Smuggler?" one of them asked.

"Trooper?"

"Jedi?"

"You're coming with us," the three puppet like men said, He was completely unable to resist them, as he and the others disappeared and reappeared elsewhere.

"Disciplinary Chamber," said the red lettering on the wall.

"Your character file has been corrupted, can you give us your Account ID," one of them said.

"Huh?" Willard said, "what am I in trouble for, am I dreaming?"

"You managed to show up on another person's ship, and you have no class, unknown equipment skills and no level. We want to help fix this data corruption and figured out why it happened. Were you trying to break anything?"

"I was on a mission, and then I showed up here," Willard said. "Is this Saigon, or am I back in Japan or back in the US?"

"This server is region locked to US customers. We'll restore your data, but since we don't know anything about how your character was set up, we need to ask you some questions."

"Am I dreaming?"

Willard couldn't understand a thing they were saying.

"Please calm down. You're character can be repaired to be either a level 1 trooper or a smuggler. Which would you prefer?"

Willard decided to go along with the green puppet in his strange dream, "Explain them both to me."

"Troopers are heavily armed special forces of the republic. They serve the republic with their weapons, armor and dedication, and are often involved in special missions. Smugglers, on the other hand, use smaller weapons and cleverness, and work to make credits trading in contraband goods throughout the galaxy. However, lately they've turned to supporting the war effort on the Republic side."

"What are credits?" Willard asked.

"Basically money."

"Bah, they fight for money. Forgot that, special ops for me," Willard said. This was either a dream, or a bizarre psychological test.

"It appears we do have your account information after all. Your character overwrote the Tamaraigh character in the database. You're paid up for the current month, so we'll give you full access. I'm teleporting you to the Trooper introduction now. There's still more to figure out, but with our logs we should be able to find the source of the corruption.

Tamaraigh had "died" on the boat, and re-appeared to the astonished crewman 20 seconds later. Her respawn was the back of the boat. Could be inconvenient if she got far from it, and didn't find another spawn point.

"Qyzen," she said, bringing him back.

No one said anything. They backed away from Tamaraigh and Qyzen.

"It's time for us to be off this boat, and figure out what's going on," Tamaraigh said to Qyzen.

"Qyzen agrees. Not like Jedi to sit."

Tamaraigh laughed, there were so many jedi that did stay in the same place for years. Especially at the temple.

"Never get off the boat!" the Chief said. "It's suicide out there. There's no one friendly out there. Are you a retard."

"We'll be going now," Tamaraigh said, matter-of-factly. "Thanks for your information about this planet's conflict.

There was a mission somewhere, she knew that. She wouldn't have been sent here in such an unusual manner if there wasn't.

"Ready to swim?" she asked Qyzen.

"Is not avoid."

They jumped into the disgusting river, which pulled them steadily downstream as the boat motored upstream, increasing the distance between them.

It was a few minutes before they reached the banks, soaking wet. It started raining. It was a heavier rain than she had seen on any of the world's she'd been on.

"Let's hope we respawn on land and not back at that boat."

"Hope no need for such things."

A speeder wouldn't help in this thick jungle.

Tamaraigh activated her saberstaff and started cutting through the jungle. Qyzen used his techblade to do the same.

Five minutes later, when Tamaraigh heard the sound of the locals' powerful guns, she went invisible, got low to the ground, and watched Qyzen turn invisible too.

The two spotted, and swung around the flank of the men that were headed to where they had been. The sound of hacking in the forest had aroused attention.

There were a half dozen of the men, and their guns were enough to kill her in one hit. At least the local hostiles were not force users. She thought sarcastically.

They must have been group mission level enemies, she decided, and kept her distance from them. When she and Qyzen reappeared, they had stowed their weapon, and were quietly navigating through the forest.

She could pick off smaller groups of the weapon users perhaps, but not so many. Not until she grew more familiar with the weapon's capabilities.

A ranged fighter such as a republic trooper, would have a better time against these enemies, she thought. How well would trooper armor hold up to the local's weapon. Qyzen had been shot in the face, so that wasn't a test of armor, and Tamaraigh's robes didn't really count as armor.

Tamaraigh expected perhaps a twenty minute hike through the jungle before they would find a clearing and directions where to go next. Qyzen knew more about jungles having gone big game hunting in them before, and was worried just how big the jungle they were in was.

The puppets were gone, the others were gone. Now he was on another ship, moving fast across a landscape that didn't look too unfamiliar. It felt like a helicopter, so he thought of it as one, and got more comfortable. He looked down. He was wearing a garish red and steel set of armor plates with some kind of weird ear equipment holding a weapon he'd never seen before in his life.

"Calm down Rook," said the man who sat across from him. "I'm Gearbox, I keep Havoc squad operational. Glad to have another member of the team."

This Gearbox was some sort of maintenance tech, he recognized. Havoc Squad was a new designation.

"What are you authorized to tell me about Havoc Squad?" Willard asked.

"Other than you being the new Havoc Squad rook? We're special forces, you'll meet the rest of the team soon enough. We're trying to retrieve a ZR-57 Orbital Strike Bomb that the separatists on Ord Mantell have got their hands on. The rest you'll learn as you go."

The helicopter (as he called it) was hit. He recognized the shaking. A helicopter hit with a missile is a goner. Crap.

"We're crash landing, hold on," the pilot yelled from up front.

The copter came to a stop, thudding into the ground. He was fine, and so was this Gearbox.

"Go on ahead, take out their surface to air launchers. I'm not a fighter, so you'll have to do it yourself," Gearbox said.

He was supposed to take out missile launchers, by himself, without knowing any of the specs of the weapon he was carrying or how to strip it, repair it and aim it.

It could be a small guerrilla force with the launchers, he thought.

The 'copter' that he had been in was, in fact, not a copter at all. WIllard couldn't identify how it flew at all. It looked like a big white brick.

This was not a guerrila force, he realized, as soon as he looked at the city street ahead of him. He couldn't identify the factions, but one of the groups had almost ten times the men as the other, but the outmanned group didn't fall back.

He approached one of the outnumbered fellows, on a hunch, while keeping low to the ground, gun? at the ready.

The soldier didn't attack him, but spoke to him instead. "The separatists are swarming the area and attacking any ships that pass through here. They've got plenty of anti-air capability. If you're going into that mess to take out the sams, you might as well take out their jammers. I need to transmit intel back to Fort Garnik and that sure ain't happening while those jammers are operational."

"Where's the rest of your army, this seems like a straight up fight, not special forces," Willard said.

"Scattered all over the place. We weren't equipped for such a large insurgency. Could really use your help. Report back to Fort Garnik once you clean up Drelliad village."

Another trooper, with the same weapon and clothes he had ran up to the soldier as well.

"Sergeant Blyes has new dialog?" said the trooper, "I'm up to date on all the patch notes, I thought."

Blyes saluted Willard as he ignored the other trooper, understanding nothing of what the man said.

Willard crouched in the grass a bit past the soldier.

This was a battle, and one special forces trooper, especially one with a weapon that he didn't know like a friend, was asking too much. Willard watched as the crazy nonsensical trooper ran right up into the village with no strategy.

Willard crept forward to watch the man die, and saw that he was fighting the enemy at short range, standing stock still in the middle of the village, and not dying. What the hell?

Willard aimed at one of the separatists fighting the crazy trooper, and pulled the trigger. Nothing happened, except that the weapon actually spoke to him. "No target acquired" it said effeminately.

Keeping low, he spotted one separatist on the outskirts of the village. He eyed him up, looked at the man and tried to fire his weapon again. "Out of range".

What, these weapons didn't work from 60 feet, are you kidding me?

He crept closer to the separatist who wasn't with the rest. Willard finally realized that the separatists weren't all human. His target had blue skin instead.

30 feet, he guessed, and he fired. The gun fired this time, hit the separatist head on, but didn't phase him. The man shot back at Willard with a smaller, more pistol like weapon.

The shot stung, but nothing more. He held the trigger down, it only fired once. It was actually a segmented trigger. He had been hitting the bottom trigger, which covered 70% of the grip. He pulled the top trigger, and a grenade of sorts launched from the barrel of the gun. The separatist still didn't fall. Still shooting Willard from the same position and stance.

Curious, and foolishly. Willard ran up to the separatist. He fired the gun point blank in the energy burst mode, and killed the separatist. The man hadn't run, hid, or stopped firing as he approached. Was he fighting machines that looked like men?

There were plenty of other separatists around, but they didn't try to shoot Willard. He guessed that if these weapons only worked from 40 feet in, and they were just robots, then maybe they didn't care to swarm him.

He had been hit 3 times, but the pain went away rapidly, and he felt as healthy as before.

Willard had to find a real gun.

Tamaraigh and Qyzen came out of the jungle into a clearing, into a substantial group of soldiers. Tamaraigh was still not sure who the friendlies were around here.

This time, the weapon fire was much faster, and louder. Extending her lightsaber, Tamaraigh tried to deflect one of these new weapons. The lightsaber blade was deflected towards the ground violently when the projectile hit it. Tamaraigh found she was still able to go invisible.

Stealth and luck was the only reason they weren't back on that boat. She snuck around the enemy position while invisible, getting away from where the soldiers continued to shoot.

"Cease fire," yelled the man in charge. These other soldiers, the VC, hadn't spoken common. But this group did.

She couldn't force persuade so many people at once. Soldiers, once they start shooting at someone, seldom consider them a friend later. They would shoot if Tamaraigh reappeared.

Finding a place to hide for the moment, she said to the Trandoshan. "I need to find different clothes, and you need to disappear for now, these people don't seem to know the Trandoshans exist, and they are our best chance of figuring out what's happening here.

"Will find favor elsewhere," Qyzen said.

"I'll ask for you again soon."

Qyzen disappeared.

Tamaraigh shadowed the movements of the group of men, staying invisible.

They were on patrol, and now returning to base, which gave her a chance to find the nearest base around here.

It was another hour of staying close to them, invisible, but then they reached a set of four vehicles. They were strictly ground transportation for the local soldiers.

Most of the soldiers piled into the back of the first two vehicles, leaving room for climbing into the third one. The back of these vehicles was large, and open to the elements, without any good seating choices. The soldiers sat comfortably on top of the metal rim of the vehicle, or on the metal bed in the middle.

Tamaraigh stayed to the edge, in case someone hit her on accident and realized someone else was in the vehicle.

She almost fell off the vehicle when it started moving, but she braced herself, and rode along with two soldiers, completely invisible the whole time. She hadn't been forced to operate so stealthily in the past, but she didn't want to spook or make enemies of these people.

It was a bouncy ride, as the vehicle neither flew or hovered over the uneven surface of the planet.

She listened to the conversation the two soldiers in her truck had going.

"Kim says he saw a monster out on patrol."

"Kim's an idiot."

"There was something out there, they didn't want to fight, knew they would be outnumbered. When have the VC ever acted like that?"

"Stop being stupid."

"I bet whatever was out there is tracking us now, waiting for the right time to pounce, and then we get stuck with the last truck.

Interesting, someone had seen them skulking about and noticed Qyzen Fess, and felt like he was a monster rather than Trandoshan.

"We've got leave coming up, you really need it Eric, you're going insane."

"You've always been a hardass Keith,"

They lapsed into silence, and then sleep. The invisibility was wearing her down. If she wanted clothes to blend in, she was going to have to steal from these people's stockpiles.

The hours passed, and she tried to stay awake and hold on to the invisibility. Hours later, the truck came to a stop, Eric opened his eyes.

There was a woman in the back of the truck with him and Keith. Out of the deepest sleep he'd had in weeks, he swore first, before he acted.

She wore grey robes, her skin complexion was vaguely olive. She didn't belong with the unit. Maybe a buddhist nun or something he guessed.

"Shit! who are you?" Eric yelled. The other trucks were slowly unloading, as he said it.

Keith reacted quicker than him, pulling out his rifle.

Before he could shoot he went falling over the edge of the truck.

"You, listen to me."

Eric felt like listening to the robed monk.

"Tell the other man why he fell."

"You're so clumsy Keith. Remember we're taking this local back to HQ."

"Bring me to your HQ."

"Alright lady, back to hq."

With his pistol at her back, and her apparent cooperation with all the words of acceptance and encouragement, he took the lady to HQ tent.

"What do I want with some medicine woman?" Captain Frenell shouted.

"Take her to Camp Walker if she's one of theirs or let her go if she's one of our friendlies."

"Who are you?"

"A friendly medicine woman of sorts. I am somewhat known as a healer."

"Go back to your village then," Eric said.

Williard didn't finish dealing with the separatists. The idea of dealing with these VC equivalents unequipped was ridiculous. A weapon was what he needed.

He got shot at by several goons looking like they had sniper rifles with only 40 foot range.

His gun had the grenade, the single shot and now a energy burst.

He swore he hadn't seen all the trigger mechanisms before.

He was hurt badly, and had to lie in the tall grass, thinking he was bleeding out before he realized all his strength and blood had returned to him.

This was still a crazy weird dream. He'd heard of Pong but never this.

Fort Garnik was a small outpost in Nam size. Like the ones up river a ways. No shelling however.

For its small size there were still quartermasters offering to sell equipment for credits.

Class ID: Trooper + 4efc93a not found

Vendor Trooper array[4efc93a] found

Equipment list updated

It was like a narrator in Willard's head.

The last Quartermaster said, "Looks like your prices are in mission reputation points."

Williard - Decorated Special Forces Veteran

Rep (x5): 173,000

M1911 Pistol 45,000

M16 Rifle 130,000

OG107 Fatigues 60,000

Hi-Tech Scope 125,000

Unlock more by leveling Trooper + 4efc93a

Williard realized that even with his history he couldn't get more than a pistol and fatigues or a M16.

This colorful armor would make him stand out like a clown.

Buy M1911 Pistol

Buy OG107 Fatigues

The q even took the colored armor from him, giving him 500 of these points.

Quest Complete! 25 xp, 25 pts

68,525 pts

Level 1 XP 150 of 500

What was it, Willard thought to himself. 50 Meters effective range. 165 feet?

What would happen when he shot seps from 165 feet if even their snipers had to get within 40 feet?

It would be best if he shot from 100 feet until he got the pistol sighted in.

A tad close, except camo could help him. Where does a hard drinking hard fighting man get some camo paint?

A few of the crazy armored "troopers", and a scantily clad "scoundrel" passed him by as he shuffled along, off the side of the road back to the main seps AA positions.

He eyed more of the sep "snipers".

Ammo, where's my ammo? He thought, his belt cache was full somehow.

Did I forget buying the cartridges?

.45 ACP. He loaded the 7 round mag. Popped it in.

Feeling naked fighting alone with no war camo, he nonetheless slunk down prone, aiming for the first sep's teeth. The sep was an ugly beast of a thing. Now that he thought about it.

Blam, blam.

Two shots into the sep's chin area, one left an inch, one right.

The impact spread and shattered the sep's jaw and lodged fragments in his throat. He tumbled but lived, yelling. Adjusting the sights a bit Williard aimed for the nose. Yellow, brown and huge.

The shot hit the bridge of the nose instead of its protrusion.

One last caterwaul brought death.

Reloading, adjusting sights back down slightly, he aimed for the left eye and fired three rapid. The third shot hit the eye brow, the first two pierced through, eye to brain.

Something sparkled around the first dead sep. He snuck forward through the tree line to the slight depression in the hill country. Ammo, which the sep didn't use with his strange gun that was not a gun.

Local coins. And, oddly enough, two cigarettes, looking clean as a whistle in the middle of the blood pool.

He'd have to find a light later.


	2. Dumb as a Box of Drunk Privates

Tamaraigh found it easy to blend in more, away from the army HQ.

Rutted dirt roads and occasional soldier with the badge MP.

She tried to explain, but the MPs responded in a big goofy accent, as if they were mocking who she was supposed to be.

Eventually she intoned village, village and they pointed her way.

She was crestfallen when she got to the village and realized the villagers didn't speak common.

They ushered her into a tent while she didn't know what to say.

What would their reaction be if she spoke common.

Instead, she reached out with the forced and began to hover above the mat on the floor.

On a lark she spoke, a word was but which would not seem to be in common.

"Qyzen. A'quets Veer'tcha."

Come, silently, she said. Normally he had a phrase or quip in common.

Qyzen nodded as he appeared.

"Wuh. The villagers reacted. An elder with a staff clonked Qyzen on the forehead."

"Quapa," Still, she said in Transdoshan.

The elder spoke quickly, and the other villagers left. The elder and an elderly woman remained.

She withdrew her saberstaff, and positioned it horizontally, extending the yellow crystaled saber in both directions.

The woman started to reach at the blade, and Tamaraigh quickly moved the staff and herself backwards.

"Nuku!" Qyzen said, speaking to the woman.

He spoke rapidly in Trandoshan, quicker than Tamaraigh could understand. The language shifted into something more sing-song, as the locals spoke back.

Finally, the elder and elderly woman left.

Qyzen waited, peering out through the tent flaps, until the two were out of earshot.

Quietly he spoke, in that raspy Trandoshan common. "An odd sort of accent of Qyzen's friends. Friends on travels, hunts. They speak it, but not as easy as their own speech."

"It hurts my nostrils to speak it, but Scorekeeper honor me if we find friends to fight honorable battles. Some men I've seen. Not many. Honor to fight for elders and children, Herald."

"What did you tell them, once you figured out how to speak?" Tamaraigh asked

"They ask where you come from. It's hard to translate, but they want to know your ways. I said the Herald is here on behalf of the Shik-Ma, the Grand Beingness of Justice, which was closest Qyzem comes to Herald of the Scorekeeper."

"They questioned the idea of a woman being the representative of Justice, but I said I was your Champion, indebted to your service. Shik-Ma comes! And the pale skins must join the West, North and Eastern Winds in being cast back to where they come. This was the talky that Qyzen had convinced match their own word thought big ideas."

"The Pale Skins?"

"Qyzen not know who they are."

"You're smarter than you think. What's our next step?"

"Jedi meditates, sleeps, in the morning, Scorekeeper praises for Herald's protection of village."

It was like an covering fire maneuver, but he was the only one hopping forward. He took no hits, and killed eight more, so-called snipers.

The voice between his ears sounded once, saying: Ding!

Cigarettes, chocolate, MREs. A weapon he couldn't use, that the sep wasn't using either. Odd things that seemed to sparkle after he killed another sep.

Finally he snuck and killed his way back to the sergeant looking to communicate to command. He could have walked the man's message back to command, but the Serg was still looking to send it on the radio.

There were groups of 3 seps standing together, stock still, some behind things, most out in the open.

The triple tap was now his technique of choice, but it seemed the "snipers" on the hill were tougher than this lot, as each sep fell in two good shots from his service pistol.

At first he was sneaking around, even here, but when no one really aimed at him, he started firing from a standing position.

He shot 1 sep, and the other two started running towards him, and he'd try to hit them all once and then come back, but they were buckling with 1 shot, and down for the count with 2.

The Republic's soldiers were pathetically weak, and the special ops guys and smugglers were insanely durable, but fighting stupidly, in point blank combat.

The colorful armor, he could understand, if it was some kind of insanely expensive equipment. The scoundrels wore less than his fatigues and seemed to still take a lot of hits.

The seps fought like monumental morons, each focussed on shooting the republic soldiers until a spec ops or scoundrel started hurting them.

On the other hand, they sure did have numbers. He would have been a goner if they knew how to fight as well as a 12 year old child VC.

The seps seemed to pop up all around him, like they were coming out of the ground. While he was working on the jammers and the AA guns, he had to react quickly when they appeared around him. He did take a few shots, but they seemed to sting like pulling off a bandaid, nothing more.

He spent 2 hours patrolling the village, trying to bring quiet to Drelliad village.

"This is very odd," he said, two more dings in his ear, and the stings of the seps felt like the smallest pinch. He found himself wishing he had a weaker round than the .45.

A full-auto bb gun, he smirked.

Collecting his huge pile of loot into the overburdened rucksack, he jogged back to the sergeant, who was still telling someone new about how Drelliad village's jammers needed to be cleared out.

Willard was actually tired of killing, for the moment. He had stopping taking notice of all the junk he picked up from the seps. Parts and pieces, useless weapons and vitally needed ammo, and food, snacks, cigs. Other stuff he couldn't place.

"Great Job cleaning up the village, Captain Williard," the Serg said. "I'm going to get some backup down here to take the village in force."

"Here you go," said the Serg, handing him a machete for some reason.

He pulled it out of the sheath, and eyed it. Not the best machete, but something. Putting it away he started heading back to Fort Garnik.

"Fort Garnik is just up the hill," the Serg said as Williard was already headed that way.

He didn't have a tent or bunkies, but he had some idea where command was at, so he headed back that way. Half-time.

He leafed through his stuff, finding a decorative Blue figurine lighter. He lit a cigarette, and puffed in relaxation. Alcohol was no where to be found on a military base, except in the Officer's lounge. But nearby, there should be a thriving industry on providing the troops what they needed.

Willard only saw refugees and separatist sympathizers around the base. And he couldn't find the Officer's quarters.

He was an enlisted man at heart. Brought back stateside and educated, trained in blackest darkness, and given a shiny penny of officer status. He fought like a man unafraid to go through 10 miles of mud with a full pack.

It was all a sham, but it was all he had.

This place, it was different. There was a coat of paint pretending that this was a military base, but drill and discipline were notoriously lacking as he walked around the base. Comraderie was insepid, of the kind where men who didn't care to fight pretend to have fun. And there was a vein of discontent, he had seen before. A disengagement with this republic, a mysterious hushed discussion about the other. Not the seps, who were small time, but this shadow Ruskie, the Sith Empire.

When had a nation ever labeled itself an empire? Not since the Romans, or perhaps the Brits called themselves that? Napolean?

What was the name that this so-called Sith Empire used for themselves. Not the swear word used to denigrate the enemy of the republic, but the name used within.

Willard saw through some of the fake here. He realized that he had been transplanted into another bipolar conflict by proxy. Almost exactly the same, in that the separatists were nominally completely local and native, but actually were funded in a only a little bit deniable way by the Sith. He concluded this already. This was a shadow mirror universe in which fighters never learned to duck and cover at all, because the weapons were vastly less deadly, both on their own, and because of the better armor, which made a scoundrel woman's flimsy skirt protect from some kind of energy burst weapon.

So cover and natural fears were not evident on either side. Willard had been keenly adapted to his own place, and setting. But too cautious for this one.

These regular soldiers had to be draftees. Bad lottery, bad attitude.

He couldn't account for how he became part of this havoc squad, except that perhaps he had gotten so piss drunk he forgot his reassignment papers to another theater of war. Who called themselves a Republic anymore, for that matter?

The French? Democratic Republics were usually neither. From the steady patter of troop conversations he realized there was a senate, no mention of a house of representatives. There was a chancellor. The term was unfamiliar to his ears, but he knew it was some kind of ambassador position. But these people seemed to treat the term differently.

So finally, after having a hunch and going back to the Q to sell the stuff he wouldn't or couldn't use, and lighten his pack, he still had no where near enough mystery points for a M16. He went into command for the first time. Havoc Squad command.

Commander Tavus spoke to him: "Shouldn't have taken that long to clean up Drelliad Village should it? Anyway, welcome rook, to Havoc Squad."

"Yes sir. Thank you sir," Williard said with just a hint of suspicion.

"Needles, your basic medical specialist. Captain Zora, my second in command, and keen-eyed shooter. Fuse, explosives. You've already met Gearbox. Gentlemen, our assignment on Ord Mantell is to recover the ZR-57 and get off this rock.

Rook, Lieutenant Jorgan from the Infantry command will be your liason for your assignment. The rest of Havoc Squad will be preparing for a insertion into the main Sep base in the coming days. I want you to be my scout element, to gather data on Seperatist plans and force concentrations."

"Welcome Sergeant, I'm Lieutenant Eric Jorgan. Let's let the rest of the Havoc Squad continue their planning, come with me."

The LT, well, he wasn't really human. Or he had a serious case of inbreeding bordering on the absurd. Blue skin?

Have I being drinking extra heavily? Willard questioned. HE'd never heard of being busted from captain down to sergeant. Maybe he could find his service record somewhere.

Qyzen had a desire to find a worthy enemy, to accept he had been mistaken about the common speaking folks, which he knew the villagers called the Pale People. He was ready to feast on the abundance of worthy challengers amongst the men with big boomy guns. His Herald, be she of the Scorekeeper, alas he could not proceed without a blessing.

Herald Tamaraigh was uncertain how to proceed, though she had a olive tonned skin, she seemed to resent the Pale People remark, and denied that it was targetted at the soldiers they had found.

So here they were, tailing a group of soldiers who passed near the village on the way to somewhere else. Herald says, "Just listen, and observe who they are, when they know no one is watching. So Qyzen listened.

The two were invisible, inaudible, shifting through the jungle which covered over so much. Rain, wet sloppy nasty muddy rain. It made the soldiers louder than a thousand banthas.

"Any Cong staying in that village?"

"Woman, children, old men. That's it, they've all gone."

The men laughed, but Qyzen couldn't tell at what.

"Keep it in your pants, men. Routine patrol, 8 klicks, 2 men leading, 2 men trailing."

"Routine my ass."

The villagers said that many of their men had gone off to join the fight elsewhere. Others had died last time the village was raided by the Pale Men.

Qyzen didn't bother to translate everything, as actually it took a while for him to parse out their bizarre dialect of Trandoshan. Or was Trandoshan a bizarre dialect of their language?

He mulled over their strange words at night, walking the jungle by day with his Herald.

The tremendous noise of the dumb Pale soldiers muffled Qyzen's own hearing, so he was surprised when an explosion and then gunfire rocked the group.

Qyzen and his herald, put distance between them and the mysterious enemy. Tamaraigh spotted them first, pointing at the men who looked a lot like the villagers, but even more dirty. The normally sparkling clean robes of his Herald were caked with mud and dirt now. This place beat all the worlds he had since in just how insidious it's wetness and dirt were.

Maybe it helped them stay invisible more.

The Pale soldiers were flumoxed but began to operate a very effect fast shooting gun. Like the repeater mount blasters he had seen before, but with these strange deadly bullets (a word the villagers used with reluctance and he picked up on from context.)

His energy shield was lost onboard the corvette.

His Herald's lack of concern about who won the fight changed, however, when the Pale soldiers pulled back, swapping gunners on the two rapid fire bullet-guns.

Some died, but surprisingly few for the deadly weapons carried. Unlike the big fights he so relished, these soldiers fought with concealment and intimidation, afraid of being caught off guard but also aware of their enemy's fear.

It was like watching two new lightsaber fighters clumsily sparring, scared of the effectiveness of their blades.

The Pale men were running for their village, and with a steely dedication which made Qyzen grin, she appeared behind one of the soldiers and watched as her saberstaff cut right through the man with little resistance.

The men behind them who were hopefully friendly were still shooting as Qyzen leapt into the fray, smashing his techstaff into another soldier's prone body.

Herald Tamaraigh shocked other soldiers by an explosion of force that sent them flying.

"I didn't see that one coming, fall back! Into the village."

His Herald tossed another soldier like a ragdoll as he ran to catch up. The local's fire slackened and stopped, as Qyzen took shot and another shot, tumbling to the ground. Qyzen watched, with a miniscule health left, as Tamaraigh used her force abilities to surprise, where her staffsaber was too far away for full effect.

She took one shot to the gut, but proceeded to kill and scatter the remnant away from the village.

She returned, his herald, to look after him. His natural healing had not kicked in. Nor had hers.

"This feels weird. Uhh. You don't look good."

"Shh!" Qyzen said as the local fighters surrounded them.

"Who are you!" one of the fighters asked in the villager's dialect.

"My Herald, her presence, is the Herald of the Shik-Ma, and I am her orderly and regent-champion. We are friends of the local village, who have taken us in. Her presence is an accomplished healer in addition to her fighting prowess. We will show you, if you will come."

"Colonialist scum! This village is harboring green sentiments. Money, you see? Yes. And blood money, from the conniving lips of the very traitor himself, who refuses to let fair elections be held. For all Vietnam."

Qyzen looked to his Herald. When she vanished, he spoke one line, "Leave this place, or the Shik-Ma will hunt your blood for Justice."

And he disappeared as well.

This new-to-them faction proceeded to open fire all over the place, and Qyzen could only crawl, sucking in air, having worn out his stamina just talking to the leader. "Qyzen, fade," Tamaraigh whispered, "and now appear," she said, and he was healthy as a horse suddenly.

Tamaraigh was not a Sage. She could heal the force corruption, but not truly heal wounds, without a healing kit.

They carefully kept out of sight, and returned to the village. Tamaraigh was hurt. The gut shot was spilling more and more blood.

"Pale men?"

"Yes," Qyzen said. "And the others."

"Viet Cong?"

"They accused the villagers of being green with blood money. Of supporting who they called the traitor?"

"We survive," said the elderly woman, who walked behind as children, 10, 11, 12 years old carried Tamaraigh under the direction of a wirey old man.

"However we can. We have no food. But now, food."

This was a problem. Qyzen and his Herald had put the anger in both sides. "

"The Shik'ma, yes, will rise in this village?" The Elder asked. "For why have you come, having bloodied your nose against Pale men and the guerrilas?"

"Do you trust my Herald, wise one?" Qyzen asked.

"We must!"

"Forgive me, that she knows the language of the Pale folk. Do any of you know of such speech? It is a tool that will allow justice to be done in their midst."

"Sadly," the elder spoke in common. "We know of it. Speak, one who speaks in Palish, yet is not of them. I long to hear the words of a herald of Shik'na!"

"The village must move. I don't know this land. I will teach you how to meditate, though I can't promise any quick success if I do teach you," Tamaraigh said.

"Speak of your name, and I will move, and the village will move, oh Herald?"

The steady beat, a rhythmic sound, thudding through his bones, alerted Qyzen.

"Mistress?!"

"Herald, it is the Pale Men! The sky box! Save your people of Justice!"

The boom and thud was deafening. The rythmic sounds ten times over.

"Lightning and Thunder," boomed a voice across the sky.

Explosions, fire, screams and wails erupted around Qyzen and his Herald.

Bounding clear of the fire engulfing the tent, Tamaraigh was focused, as he saw in her only occasionally.

The box in the sky, one of them, anyway, came tumbling down at his herald's command.

"Flight system's malfunctioning!"

Boom, the box exploded in the dirt.

A few kids fired back at the boxes still in the air, which were swooping like birds.

His Herald was fighting with mighty power beyond what Qyzen thought she possessed. Or the boxes were surprisingly not very resistant to the force. Heavy things, hard to move, his old friend Yuon Par said.

But his Herald downed the other two sky boxes. The fire and explosives and more fire and strafing runs killed old and young alike. Women trapped in huts, burning.

His Herald did everything she could to save them. The elder was dead. The stragglers she saved and brought outside the village. One of the boxes burned in the wet jungle slowly simmering against the humidity.

"Speak to them," she whispered to Qyzen.

 _Jedi Cargo Cultists unlocked._

 _Jungle Weapon Caches unlocked._

Qyzen hadn't seen any of those weird voices in his head since they got here, but now, there they were.


End file.
